Category: food

A visit to Healthful Essence

You know where we don’t go enough? Healthful Essence.Vegan Caribbean food and raw items served cafeteria style. We would totally eat here more if it wasn’t a special trip kind of out-of-the-way. At least it isn’t far, but it’s not an area of town we generally have any other business in, the West side. But the folks are really nice and the food is delicious.

This is the $8.xx plate plus a lil something extra. I’ve got BBQ tofu, some black beans and greens. The extra part is the plantains you see on top. Bonus! She also gave Kevin this patty for everyone to share that tasted like Thanksgiving. Have no idea what it was. I’ve had their unfish before and it’s also really good. If you like mock fish stuff. The ginger beer, they make it there, had quite the bite to it so if you are a fan of spicy ginger, get it!

 

 

French White Bean and Cabbage Soup

Apparently I’m really excited about Fall and Fall foods. My last photo upload into wordpress was pretty much all bowls of food. Soup, stew, chili. Maybe I’ll get them posted before Vegan Mofo starts so I don’t have to rename the blog “Look at this bowl of crap I’m eating!”

Dried beans have been on sale at Kroger so I stocked up. They’re not that useful unless you cook them. So I soaked and slow cooked a pound of white beans. Now it’s time for a white bean party. The internets told me about this recipe for French White Bean and Cabbage Soup. I just realized when I looked up the recipe for the link that I totally forgot the parsley and liquid smoke. It was good anyway, but I have one more serving left so I’ll add those goodies and see if it becomes Next Level. This is the kind of soup that might make a good stand in for the traditional sick day chicken soup. Nice and brothy with just enough potato and bean for it to be reasonably filling. That grilled cheese with Daiya on the side helped with that also.

Oh yeah, I’m working on getting my blogroll back up. I lost it when I switched hosts and am trying to recreate from my Google Reader feeds. I’ll probably go up in pieces so consider it a work in progress.

 

 

Golden Curried Pea Soup

The weather finally broke here. I think we had a record number of 90+ degree days in Atlanta this year, or close to it. Now that we’re done with that and can even occasionally open the windows, it’s officially the beginning of soup season. Digging around in my MacGourmet recipe box, this recipe for Golden Curried Pea Soup looked appealing. It’s from Nava Atlas’ Vegan Soups and Hearty Stews for All Seasons. The barley makes it extra filling. It matures nicely in the fridge. I finished a whole recipe of it on my own by taking it for lunch and never got bored of it. You’ll see some green in there. I had some kale all cleaned and chopped up so I threw it in. It worked nicely. I also occasionally stirred in some garam masala when I felt the need for a little extra spice kick.

 

A Simple Dinner

I’ve been craving this kind of food lately. Simple, healthy. Steamed broccoli, baked beans, brown rice and tofu sprinkled with gomashio and Bragg’s. It would’ve been a greener plate but lunch was a giant bowl of kale salad. The tofu was just sautéed in a pan, beans and broccoli cooked in the microwave and rice in the rice cooker. A healthy tasty meal doesn’t have to involve a ton of work or destroying your kitchen. It can be this simple.

 

Pasta with Chinese Tahini Sauce

Do you remember your first vegetarian cookbook? One of my first ones if not the first one for me was Paulette Mitchell’s The 15-Minute Gourmet: Vegetarian. I was a student at San Francisco State University at the time and picked it up at the bookstore there. It ended up being my go to book when I first became vegetarian. My copy is covered in stains from use. While not vegan, it has a few recipes that I still use that are vegan. It’s perfect for people that aren’t that in to cooking, need quick-cooking meals and don’t want to run around town looking for special ingredients.

The Pasta with Chinese Tahini Sauce is one of those fall back meals for me. The ingredients keep well so you can push off cooking it another week if need be without anything spoiling. And it is done in the time it takes for the pasta to cook. It went well with leftover cabbage crunch from the potluck and gomashio sprinkled on top.